The Kagi Agriculture and Forestry Public School (Kano) was established in April 1919 under Japanese rule and reorganized and renamed Taiwan Provincial Chiayi Agri-Vocational School in November 1945.

The school was then upgraded to become Taiwan Provincial Chiayi Junior College of Agriculture in March 1965.

Extension and lifelong learning programs are offered in the campus to provide educational service to the local community.

Sinmin Campus is situated in West District in downtown Chiayi.

NCYU consists of seven colleges (Agriculture, Humanities and Arts, Life Sciences, Management, Science and Engineering, Teachers, and Veterinary Medicine),[9] 36 departments and 11 independent institutes, with 500 full-time faculty professors.